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two weeks of June, Roland’s vacation time, and of course they were taking Bertie with them. Bertie was walking better lately, but oddly this achievement came and went: he’d been walking better at three, for instance, than he was at the moment. One never knew. Jane had bought a suit of pale blue cotton—jacket and short trousers—and had patiently let out the waist by sewing in extra material, and had shortened the sleeves, “So he’ll look nice at the dinner table at the St. Marcy Lodge,” Jane said.
    Roland had winced, then rapidly recovered. He had always hated taking Bertie out in public, even for walks in Central Park on Sundays, and the Lodge was going to be worse, he thought, because they’d be stuck with the same people, other guests, or under their eyes, for almost two weeks. He would have to pass through that period of curious and darting glances, unheard murmurs as people confirmed to one another, “Mongoloid idiot,” then the period of studied eyes-averted-no-staring that such a group always progressed to.
    The St. Marcy Lodge was a handsomely proportioned colonial mansion set on a vast lawn, backgrounded by thick forests of pine and fir. The lobby had a homey atmosphere, the brass items were polished, the carpet thick. There was croquet on the lawn, tennis courts, horses could be rented, and there was a golf course half a mile away to which a Lodge car could take guests at any hour of the day. The dining room had about twenty tables of varying sizes, so that couples or parties could dine alone if they preferred, or join larger tables. The manager had told the Markows that the guests were never assigned tables, but had freedom of choice.
    Roland and Jane preferred to take a smaller table meant for four when the dinner hour came. A pillow was brought for Bertie by a pleasant waitress, who at once changed her mind and suggested a high chair. It was easy, she said, bustling off somewhere. Roland had not protested: a high chair was safer for Bertie, because the tray part pinned him in, whereas he could topple off a cushion before anyone could right him. Bertie wore his blue suit. His ridged tongue hung out, and his eyes, though open, showed no interest in his new surroundings, which he did not even turn his head to look at.
    “Isn’t it nice,” Jane said, resting her chin on her folded fingers, “that the Lodge put that crib in the room this afternoon? Just the right thing for Bertie, isn’t it?”
    Roland nodded, and studied the menu. He was enduring those moments he had foreseen, when the eyes of several people in the dining room had fixed on Bertie, and for a few seconds it was worse as the waitress returned with the high chair. Roland sprang up to lift Bertie into it. Slap! The tray part was swung over Bertie’s head to rest on the arms of the chair. Roland tugged Bertie’s broad hands up and plopped them on the wooden tray where his food would be set, but the hands slid back and dropped again at Bertie’s sides.
    Jane wiped some drool from Bertie’s chin with her napkin.
    The food was delicious. The eyes around them now looked at other things. Jane had edged her chair closer to Bertie’s, and she patiently fed him his mashed potatoes and tiny bits of tender roast beef. The lemon meringue pie arrived hot with beautifully browned egg white on top. Bertie brought his heavy little hand down on the right side of his plate, and his half-portion of lemon pie catapulted towards Roland. Roland caught it adroitly with his left hand and laughed, dumped it back on to Bertie’s plate, and soaked an end of his napkin in his glass of water to wash the stickiness off his palm and fingers.
    So did Jane laugh, as if they were alone at home.
    They finished a bottle of wine between them.
    As they were walking towards the stairway in the lobby, with an idea of getting Bertie to bed, because it was nearly ten, Roland heard voices behind him.
    “. . . a pity, you know? Young couple like that.”
    “. . .